I am invisible
by Gura Kruor
Summary: Eries, second princess of Asturia, has been hidden from the court and her country for reasons unknown to her; this is the story of her growth from youth to adulthood.


**DISCLAIMER:**This is a non-profit fanfic, The Vision of Escaflowne is property of Shoji Kawamori and Sunrise, please support the official release.

Hello there my dear reader, this fic was going to be my entry in the Escaprompts held in the Escafans group in dA. The theme of August-September 2014 was Alternate Universe and since then I've had it stored yet unfinished until today.

This story set in the same universe of my other fic "I am useless" but 10 years prior. It will have mentions of Eries/Folken yet, this isn't the intended pairing but another less common that this one... it is developed in later chapters so stay tuned.

Sorry for the grammar, my native language is spanish and I am a self-taught english writer. Besides I am writing in a 7'' tablet so blame the touch keyboard for the typos and the absurdness to me.

**La Stella**

Nobody noticed her presence, it was normal for her; Marlene was always in the spotlight of every situation. And even without her, she knew of unnatural ways to be out of sight. A week ago was planed that the First Princess of Asturia was going to meet the First Prince of Fanelia and her sisters obviously wanted to go with her.

It was decided that only the youngest one was going to accompany them, the Second Princess was forbidden to be with them in that travel_._With the help of her youngest sister, she managed to go in the ship and kept a low profile in her sister's bunk.

This was the moment for her to leave the levi-ship without be noticed. Her father and sisters, and of course the Caeli knights, were leaded to the Throne Room by a servant after landing in the Palace.

She took her time to observe this country, and fell in love with it at first sight, drinking every drop of its beauty. Reality exceeded fiction, every book she had read about Fanelia spoke of it as the land of the samurais and dragons, full of superstition and magical forests. Just by a simple glance the differences between her homeland and this country could be seen, but it wasn't as if she had ever left her country or the palace where she was born.

While Fanelia cherished the bravery of the samurai and the rituals to the Dragon of the sky, Escaflowne; Asturia treasured the chivalry of the Caeli knights and worshiped the Dragon of the sea, Jeture. Both were neighbor countries, only separated by the sea and a forest in their respective frontiers. That was what she had read in a book her older sister gave her as her birthday gift six years ago.

Soft naked feet touched the ground and followed closely the group, to every person, there was only a mysterious wind moving their clothes. Her youngest sister noticed her and, when believing she was going to be discovered, acted as a smoke screen bringing all the attention to her.

According to the book, and the guide, the royal castle was built in the time when dragons were still a menace to the people and the stone walls were strong enough to survive a big fire so it was used as their shelter before becoming a kingdom. The guide knew all what was in the books, or the books had what any guide could've known, whatever you wanted to see it; but even if she knew what he was going to say she kept silently listening… until something called her.

A presence inside this place was luring her; she stood still in the way and closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them, her father and sisters with all the knights and fanelian guide, weren't there and she was alone as well as lost.

_Don't panic Eries, I can return to the gate and to the ship, we are still close and surely Millerna will tell father that I am here. _Thegirl went to the gate but soon noticed that she couldn't remember the way back.

A melody flew to her and wishing to ask for help, she entered to the place where the music was coming from. The door was half open and a light was in a corner of the room.

There were lots of books in many shelves and scattered in the floor, there were no windows at sight. The eyes of the princess adjusted to the lack of proper light and with soundless steps approached to a cloaked person; said person was the one whistling the music.

"I know that you are behind me, drop your mask and show yourself," the hooded man was still reading and didn't turn to see the girl.

The Princess panicked and wishing to return walked backwards and stumbled upon a stack of books; in that instant she was visible.

A girl with silver hair was in the middle of the room, her blue dress covered every part of her body but her face and hands for she had a bonnet covering most of her head; she had a pair of slippers in one hand and with the other was taking her skirt above the floor, showing her slim feet to the stranger. Her blue eyes showed fear in them.

The man took his hood and turned to see her after standing from his chair, he had a letter opener in his hand.

He was a young man, not much older than her own sister; his long and spiky blue hair was covering his shoulders and he was observing her with curiosity. He was much taller than her and surely stronger for even under his cloak he seemed to have a muscular build.

"Oh my, a girl," he chuckled "Who are you and why you are in this room?" his deep voice wasn't menacing but unfriendly.

_Now she sent me a girl? I thought that woman was intelligent, but a girl? What harm can she do to me? It's more likely that I am the one who will end defeating her and yet… _He saw fear in her but her eyes were dry. _Surely she is a brave one._

Eries opened her dry lips and stuttering, answered to his question: "I-I am Er-Eries Ari-a Aston, I g-got lost and was sear-searching for h-h-h-help".

The young man wanted to contain his laugh but it was no longer possible. His loud laugh was heard in the room and he had to cover his red wine eyes with a hand in signal of shame. _Aston? Then she is part of the group visiting the palace. _He thought while walking to the door, he passed a shocked Eries, and locked the room with a key.

_What is he doing?! He is closing the door… what am I going to do now?! _She was truly afraid and was trembling, waiting to be stabbed to the death or something worse.

"Don't be afraid, Princess Eries. I am not going to hurt you," he kept the key in his pocket and offered her a seat next to the desk.

"I am Dune de Fanel, surely you came with your father and sisters," he sighed "When I am here the world seems to disappear and time starts to flow at a strange rate," the light of the candle tilted a little when he sat.

_Dune, so he is the one Marlene is going to marry, why is he not surprised? He even knew that I wasn't visible and yet he isn't asking me about it, not even has awe in his eyes._

"Don't worry, I don't bite," he said in a mocking tone.

The princess didn't noticed his voice tone while dropping her shoes to the ground and wearing them before walking slowly to the chair and taking a seat.

"So tell me, princess Eries, why did you ended up here?" he took a cup, poured tea in it and handled it to the girl. She took the cup and after checking if it was clean, which fortunately was, drank a sip.

"I was visiting the castle, a guide was showing us the place," she put the cup in the table, "I got lost while observing one of the paintings in the wall," she told a white lie, nobody could believe her if she said something about the wordless voice and the melody.

"You don't know how to lie," he took the letter opener and put the end of the blade in his finger, but it didn't pierced his skin.

"How rude of you to tell that I, Eries Aria Aston, Second Princess of Asturia, is lying; that could be taken as an insult to my people," she straightened her back to look more royal.

"I know you are lying because I was the one calling for you," he pointed to her with the blade.

_But, how? _Thought the princess, for her the trick she performed was something out her understanding and at the same time too natural for her to question it.

"I did it unwillingly" he answered to an unspoken question' "as soon as you landed I knew somebody like me was in the castle, truth be told I wasn't expecting you to be a young girl, maybe somebody older for the potential you show. This is my first time meeting with somebody like you so, could you please tell me what you felt?"

She remembered the previous moments, how could she explain him about this supernatural event?

"I _felt_ somebody calling me without a voice but with an emotion, I closed my eyes to focus in the sound and then I was all alone in the middle of the hall, after that I heard a melody from this room and that's my reason to be here."

Each bit of information was useful for him who was still learning how to do this kind of trick. He had learned how to move objects by mere will without touching them many years ago but to _call _somebody was a complete different matter. The fact that with her it was an easier task than with others made him wonder a bout the nature of this ability itself but maybe it was because both of them were _alike _that it worked.

He observed her for a while; something was off in her, not physically but in her attire. She was a princess and yet her dress was quite simple; he had saw once the princess of Zaibach and all about her, even if she was still a child a little younger than this one, screamed _extravagant_ but this wasn't Eries' case.

_Maybe she is conservative, but her style is really _serious _for a girl of her age. All in her tells me that she doesn't fit not only for her fashion sense but for something deeper yet related to it. _He opened his eyes after realizing what was off with her.

"Take off your bonnet, Princess Eries; it is starting to make me uncomfortable," he took the lace of the cloth and wanted to untie it but the girl stopped his hand out of her face and retied the cord.

"I don't want to take it off, I just want to return to my ship and if you are going to keep the information away from me I will leave you alone to continue with whatever you were doing," she stood up and was going to leave.

Suddenly, the fanelian prince took her hand and pulled her to himself. With a preternatural speed, he untied the lace of the bonnet and took it off her.

Pointy ears were framed for blonde platinum hair that reached the small of her back. Unconsciously, she blushed and in matter of seconds, vanished in the air. He kept grabbing her and put the hat in her hand with an apologetic expression.

"Don't take me wrong, it is an apostasy for a person with the blood of the people of Nale to keep their ears out of sight," he guided her to the chair and as soon as the girl sat, she pulled her hand and put again her bonnet.

"Nale? I don't know what you are talking about," she was angry but completely clueless and really curious about the matter.

"It doesn't makes sense and at the same time it does, I've heard rumors of the royal family having a link with the people from the Nale tribe but until today I thought them to be lies," he was telling this more to himself than to the girl.

"I am sorry if I scared you but obviously you don't know about your roots," he walked to a book shelve and started to roam his fingers over the spine of the books, reading their titles without his eyes but with his skin, after some minutes he found what he was searching and opened the big volume in front of the princess showing the draw of a woman.

Said female had white hair and was the bearer of a preternatural beauty. But what picked Eries' attention were her pointy ears. Instinctively, she touched her own over the cloth that was now covering them.

"But…. How?" he put the book in the desk and she followed the lines of the portrait with her fingertips. From her closed eyes to her distinctive attire and the marks in her forehead, this woman was almost familiar to her.

For years her father had obliged her to wear a bonnet just for the sake of covering her strange pointy ears, making her feel conscious about them and all her persona in the process. She thought them to be some kind of deformity but the book said it was _normal_. To be precise, it said the following:

_"Deep in the Floresta Mountains lies the village of Nale, little is known about its population for their secrecy and self seclusion. The few travelers who returned from their town speak about a peaceful tribe which a "Winged goddess" and has no means for war. The reason no country had tried to invade them lies in the rumors of them having strange ways to defend themselves._

_They aren't different from any human besides their pointy ears and melodic voices, all of them have a common gift with music. It is said that most of them have a bizarre affinity with the unknown side of this world."_

The princess turned the page and found some of the stories told by the explorers who ventured into the forest searching for that village. Most of them were almost unintelligible and some were like a tale. Of course for her all of them were fascinating and made her more curious each time she finished one of their descriptions. After reaching the end, she had no doubt about her having ancestors from Nale, yet the reason was still unclear.

She looked up to the prince who gave her the book in search of an answer she knew he didn't had.

Well, this is the first chapter of a long Eries centric story. Why did I call Folken Dune? It is because for the AU this is pre-movie Folken, so he is Dune until he joins (in this continuity) the Zaibach Empire.

As I said in the beginning this is set ten years prior to I am useless so Folken is 15 and Eries is 11, Marlene is 15 and Millerna is four, the same as Van.

Like with all my fics I'll try to continue the story even if it has almost no readers. Sadly I have only some minutes of spare time in odd hours of the day so it will be updated irregularly. See you until next time, take care and if you wish leave me a review, anything is welcomed and answered, even torches and stones.

_Myth and legend ride with you_


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